


The Curse of Xenopedia

by catty_the_spy



Series: Tserillian!verse [21]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Fpreg, Kid Fic, M/M, Made Up Science, Minor Injuries, Mpreg, Other, Serious Injuries, mentions of self harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-12
Updated: 2013-04-12
Packaged: 2017-12-08 06:04:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/757935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/catty_the_spy/pseuds/catty_the_spy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There’s an unusual plague ravaging the ship. Life, love, and pamphlets on the starship <i>Enterprise</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Curse of Xenopedia

Nyota sits across from him at dinner. “I hear the nausea’s pretty bad.”

Leonard shrugs. “It’s easing up.”

She toys with her salad. “How is it? Being telepathically connected to them?”

“I can’t describe it,” Leonard says. “It’s different from normal telepathic contact, especially right now – more of an awareness than a bond. Not much of a mind to connect to.”

“Not yet anyway.” She smiles. “What does Joanna think?”

“Excited mostly. She likes the idea of being a big sister; I think she wants someone to boss around.”

Nyota laughs and then sighs. “I always used to wonder,” she says after a while, “what it’d be like. When I was still with Spock, I wondered how it would feel to be bonded to someone, to be bonded to a child. Spock and I would meld sometimes, but that’s nothing like a bond.”

“It’s less annoying than one.”

Nyota throws a piece of spinach at him. 

  


There’s a cup of Vulcan tea waiting for him at the next senior staff meeting. It can’t have been Spock. He raises his eyebrows at Nyota. She returns the gesture with a grin.

  


Nyota and Leonard are having a nice conversation about Vulcan’s tight-lippedness – well, Nyota’s conversing and Leonard’s ranting – when Jim crash lands at their table.

“Bones, please tell me you had nothing to do with these?”

He’s holding out a small booklet. Leonard pulls it from his grip.

“Your one step guide to quick and easy interspecies sex,” Leonard reads. His eyebrows shoot up with a speed that would put Spock to shame.

“It’s a new database,” Sulu says, shoving Jim out of his way. “The only thing more hilarious than the tagline is hearing Pavel _read_ the tagline.”

Jim cackles. “I can just imagine. ‘Cleek eet before you unzeep eet’.”

“The two of you are terrible,” Nyota says.

Sulu shrugs. “If I can’t make fun of my boyfriend, who can? You should hear him give me shit about fencing.”

“‘The biggest encyclopedia of reproductive methods in the universe’? That I doubt.” Leonard scowls as he flipped through it. “Where did you get this?”

“The nurses have been handing them out like candy,” says Sulu. “Engineering is flooded.”

“I have six,” Jim adds. “Seriously, if this is punishment for that plug thing, I swear it wasn’t my fault. They lied about their semen! And it only happened once!”

Sulu nudges him. “I think the removal process was punishment enough.”

“I don’t want to hear about it,” Leonard snaps. “This is the first time I’ve seen this.”

  


“Xenopedia” is a huge and incredibly detailed database. There’s information for most known sentient species. The bits the creators think are important are in a list at the top; the rest is dense text in a small size that can’t be suitably scaled up.

He gives up on it to place his nightly vidcall to the Vulcan colony. Joanna should be about done with the preliminary tests; as soon as the board settled on a placement she’d start school.

He misses her so much.

She’s happy to hear from him, bright-eyed and smiling, with sunscreen smudged on her nose. Sarek has replaced Spock as her favorite person – she can’t stop mentioning things “Grandpa” said and did.

“I had to take a _lot_ of tests,” she says. She’s sitting too close to the monitor. Her face fills the screen, tanned and a bit freckled. “A lot a lot. And then I had to see three doctors for more.”

“That is a lot,” Leonard agrees. He can see her feet kicking in the background. “Don’t fall.”

“I won’t! I’m on it good and I’m leaning on the back so it can’t slide. Did you know Vulcan-school would have so many tests? I haven’t even started yet!”

“Human-school has just as many, I promise. What did they test you on?”

“Everything. They asked if I read good and can I add and subtract, and they were surprised I could do big numbers. And they asked me science stuff like how do bodies work. I got to tell them about how cells are like fabric balloons with important stuff inside, and the walls of the balloon let important stuff in and out. I explaineded like you taught.”

“I’m proud of you. When do you start taking classes?”

“I start regular school in a week, because Grandpa Sarek says I speak Vulcan good enough so I can keep up. He says hi. I’ve been practicing a lot.” Her forehead bumps the screen and she scowls. “I don’t mind practicing but it’s boring and it’s hot.”

“Georgia was hot.”

“This is _hotter_. And I have to wear lots of sunscreen and it smells gross.”

Joanna begins a run through of her daily routine and Leonard just leans back and listens. He’s been worried that her nerves would get the best of her, but she’s flourishing, just as happy on New Vulcan as she was on the Enterprise. 

“And Grandpa Sarek said its name was E China, and it’s enormous. Grandpa Jack was scared it’d hurt me but E China’s real nice. There aren’t a lot of E China’s left since Old Vulcan went away, but Grandpa Sarek got me a toy one and I took it with me to the doctor when I got my shots.”

“That was nice of him.”

“I know! I said so too. T’Niri said Vulcan’s don’t do nice but I said _everyone_ does nice. If Vulcans weren’t nice, then nobody would be friends with them. I think Vulcans are just grumpy sometimes, like you. Remember how our cat would be mean sometimes, and mommy said he was just grumpy? Everybody gets grumpy.”

“That’s true. I know for a fact that Spock gets grumpy. I can see in his head.”

“You don’t even have to look in his head,” Joanna says, very earnestly. “I was gonna teach him how to pretend better, but school comes first.”

Leonard grins.

  


Sneezing his way through his shift isn’t how Leonard had anticipated pregnancy to go. It was only slightly less awful than seeing his sickbay covering in pamphlets. The worst thing about plastipaper was that it didn’t crumble properly.

“Doctor I-”

“Hechoo!”

“Doctor.” Christine holds out a PADD. “Ensign Tsorkad’s tests results? I think the medicated drops would be better.”

“He’s not fighting off the infection?”

Christine nods. “Most of his people got it as children; by all rights he should have gotten through it by now. I checked, it’s not a new strain.”

“Do you think he’s lying about having had it before?”

“Maybe.” Christine sits on the edge of his desk. “I double checked his symptoms: dry eyes, secondary eyelids don’t retract, delayed tongue retraction, fluid retention in his neck…unless there’s another disease with the exact same symptoms that we don’t know about…”

Leonard nods, skimming the information she’s given him. “Check the database again, see if we missed something. In the mean time, I’ll get him the drops and ask him a few more questions. Oh, and Chris!” He holds up one of the pamphlets taking over his desk.

She smiles. “I’ll talk to them. I don’t know where they’re coming from.”

“Where they’re coming from isn’t the problem. Database first.”

Christine nods.

  


“I think I pulled something.”

“That’s obvious,” Leonard snaps, scanning the lieutenant with a tricorder. “You also have some pretty serious bruises. What have you been up to?”

Lt. Morington blushes to the tips of his floppy ears. “Not much, Doc. Just a new exercise routine.”

Leonard raises his eyebrows. “Exercise, huh?”

He leaves the biobed and comes back with a hypo and a PADD. “Why don’t you do some reading while I patch you up.”

“It really was an accident. We got a little too enthusiastic.”

“And now you’ll make sure to be careful.” 

  


Jim jokes about giving the baby a signed photograph of himself, or a Starfleet Captains calendar. He also threatens to throw Leonard a baby shower, and Leonard seriously considers killing him.

Leonard suffers through a day of ridiculous suggestions and gag gifts, but when he stops by his office one more time before going off-shift, he finds a basket of genuine, naturally grown, Georgia peaches, and a dog eared copy of _A Child’s History of the Federation_. 

Maybe he won’t kill Jim.

  


“…So I’ve been shitting these round things for days, and I’m starting to get a little worried. I’m bloated and I’ve got fierce cramps.”

Christine sighs. “Who’d you sleep with, again?”

The ensign blushes. “I’d rather not say.”

“Look, you can tell me or you can tell Dr. McCoy because I’m going to take these” – she holds up the jar of marble sized balls – “and I’m going to let him run the tests on them, and on you, and he’s going to test for any –.”

The ensign blurts a name in a flash, red with embarrassment.

Christine nods, clearly pleased. “Smart. I’ll have to check to be sure, but she has an ovipositor so it’s safe to say these are eggs. What type of birth control are you on?”

His eyes widen. “Nurse Chapel, I –.”

Christine decides to go easy on him. “It’s highly unlikely, but it’s better to be sure. I’ll run some test on these eggs. While I’m doing that, I’d like to you read the information on this PADD. We’re going to cover all our bases.”

Her stern walk turns into a swagger as she passes Leonard, and he grins. “Good work, Chapel. Maybe next time you can handle Mr. S-and-M.”

“Terrifying people who have so much fun they end up in Sickbay? Who could pass that up?”

Christine’s snicker probably terrifies half the people listening in. Leonard’s going to enjoy her reign of terror when he finally goes on maternity leave.

  


Leonard sneezes and swears, scattering Xenopedia booklets all over the room. There’s a longsuffering sigh from deeper inside.

“Don’t start,” Leonard snaps, making his way to Nyota. “I think I’ve finally made it clear to everyone that those things aren’t allowed within ten feet of my office.”

“Lucky you.”

“This is ridiculous.”

“You can say that again,” Jim grouses. “There are ten of these for every person in this ship. I found some in my shower.”

“I wish it were tribbles instead, at least those were cute as well as annoying.”

Jim shudders. “Ugh, don’t remind me. They were breeding in my underwear drawer; I still haven’t gotten the fur out of my shorts.”

Nyota winces. “Sorry I brought it up.”

“Don’t be. We have worse things than that to worry about. Bones made Ensign Cheloid cry today.”

“The medstaff knows that those things are no longer allowed in my sickbay.”

“You made her _cry_. She thought no one would ever find her body.”

“I’ll send her some fucking flowers.”

Nyota raises her eyebrows. “What on earth did you say?”

“That is not relevant at this time.”

That’s Spock, carefully clearing his chair of tiny heart-shaped booklets so that he can sit down.

“Afternoon, Spock. Have you done your share of terrifying underlings today?”

Spock gives Jim a chilly look. “We are here to share important information.”

“Gossip is important. You have to keep up with the scuttlebutt if you want to take the crew’s temperature.”

“Dr. McCoy upsetting a sensitive member of his staff is hardly relevant to the crew’s ‘temperature’.”

“It totally is. One ensign cries, another rubs her back with sympathy and spreads rumors that Bones here has claws and fangs, next thing you know…whoosh!” Jim makes a sweeping gesture. “The crew thinks he’s turning into a vampire.”

“Evil psychic parasite is controlling his brain,” Sulu says from the door. He trips over a pile of booklets. “Much more likely rumor than vampire. Remember when Chou had that parasite and everyone thought it was a baby?”

“And she almost sent an ambassador and half of engineering out an airlock?” Jim sighs. “Being popular is a gift and a curse. Let’s get on topic before Spock kills someone; where’s Scotty?”

“Here!” Scotty crashes into the table. He smells like burnt plastic. “Ah had tae fish these booklets outta the wiring of deck five.”

“Yeah, about that…” Jim huffs. “Okay, so in a week, we’re going to hit Starbase Eight, where we’ll pick up Dr. M’Benga and Ambassador Solak. Then to the Agneerian colony, where we drop him off, pick up a very important data chit, and lurk for three days so the crew can get some sun. We’re also getting three new crewmen, and a baby cadet. Then there’s the matter of these.” Jim holds up one of the xenopedia booklets. “Bones, please tell me your nurses are done passing these out.”

“It was never my nurses,” Leonard says. “I checked. We were just talking about me making an Ensign cry over these.”

“The ones I got were from your sickbay.”

“Not everyone in sickbay wearing science blues is a nurse. Captain.”

“They are _literally_ everywhere,” Nyota says. “The reason for our twenty minute communications down time? Xenopedia booklets were inside all of our equipment; the wires were melted.”

“We need to take care of these before the ambassador comes aboard. I don’t want to be the one telling the admiralty this treaty fell through because of safe sex literature.”

  


Two days later, a ship wide ban had failed to solve the problem of overenthusiastic safe sex promoters. 

Leonard kicks a mess of xenophobia pamphlets away from his door, uncovering a box in the process. He takes in the wrapping paper with its cheery pastel blocks and prams and tries not to growl.

He’s starting to wish they’d throw him a baby shower and get it the fuck over with.

He pushes the box into his quarters with the toe of his boot, too lazy to fuss with the process of carefully squatting and just as carefully hauling himself up. He’s had a long day, his ankles are swollen, and three of his biobeds were down thanks to pamphlets getting into the wiring.

The room is blessedly free of anything with the word “xenopedia” on it. Spock is on the floor, meditating. He opens his eyes when Leonard walks in.

“Will you join me?” he says. 

Leonard wonders if pregnant Vulcans meditate twisted into pretzels on the floor. He kicks the box in Spock’s direction and huffs and grunts his way into sitting.

The least awkward position he can think of involves him holding his shins with the soles of his feet touching; it satisfies some small dark part of his hindbrain that he blames on his Tserillian heritage. 

Spock gives the box a passing glance. “This is similar in appearance to the item Ensign Harold gave to me this morning.”

“I hope it’s not the same thing,” Leonard says, though he honestly doubts it. The crew was conspiring. It was eerie.

Leonard shifts. His back produces a satisfying pop.

Spock closes his eyes and inhales. Leonard does the same, starting to loosen his grip on his telepathy. His awareness of his bond, of Spock, grew, and with it his awareness of the baby. Meditating with the baby took a lot of getting used to. It reached instinctively towards him, learning his mind and sensing his emotions, aligning its understanding of nearby minds with his own. The bigger and more developed its brain the more active it was. 

A full blooded Tserillian surrounded by others of its kind would spend its time establishing telepathic bonds with its community, strengthening its abilities and becoming intimately familiar with the people essential to its survival. The connections it formed went deeper than memory; the baby wouldn’t know that Joanna was its sister, but it would know instantly that her mind was familiar and safe, and that Joanna was trustworthy. Memory would come later.

Vulcans are as close-mouthed about their children as they are about everything, but from what Spock had said, the development of their children was much the same.

With a hybrid it was hard to be certain of anything, but this meeting of mind and almost-mind is as familiar to Leonard as breathing.

Like this, Leonard and Spock can exchange things without words. Spock shares the memory of his earlier vidcall to Joanna, her growing mastery of the Vulcan language, the word “Daddy” sticking out like a beacon in a swirl of Vulcan words. Leonard shares Tsorkad’s illness spreading to the three other members of his species on the ship, the stench of burnt plastipaper, and the vague suggestion of foot massage. 

The baby’s mind pops up in the middle of everything, unrelentingly curious. Leonard carefully swerves around it, putting up the telepathic equivalent of a baby gate. There is still contact, but Leonard can control the exchange.

Spock’s mind lingers a little longer, sharing things that are exactly the reason Leonard put up a mental gate between him and the kid, and then withdraws as Spock puts the bulk of his attention towards his meditation.

Leonard opens his eyes. He stretches awkwardly, still holding his shins. His back pops again and he lets out a relaxed sigh. 

The gift is a series of cloth diapers and a cover, so Leonard figures he can’t really complain. He’ll put it with the other things _after_ he gets Spock to help him up.

He’s built a nest in the corner behind a few of Spock’s things – another concession to his hindbrain. Hopefully he’ll drag himself to sickbay without ever retreating to it. 

  


Shaw blanches when she sees him. “Shit, I thought I was getting Chapel.”

Leonard scowls. “If I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a thousand times.”

“I know! It’s just we were on deck ten and one thing led to another and then….”

“Then you were having sex without the penile guard and you ended up here.” Leonard shakes his head. “I keep telling you, you can’t sleep with him unless he puts it on. What’s happening? Do I need to talk to him?”

.

“It’s not like that,” Shaw insists. “We just forget sometimes.”

“You can’t _forget_. Right now it’s two weeks to make sure the tissue heals, and we’re going to have to flush out his semen before it gives you an infection. If you keep this up it won’t be two weeks before you can have sex again; it’ll be _reconstructive surgery_.”

“I know, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize to me. And make sure you tell Ensign Rfrowr that I don’t care if he has to wear the damn thing all day: stop having sex without it.”

Shaw sighs. “I understand. Hey could you…I don’t want this coming back to him. He’d get upset.”

Leonard freezes with a hypospray in hand. “Are you feeling pressured in any way?”

“What? No, no, nothing like that. He just looks really pathetic when he’s worried.” Shaw grins. “I appreciate the concern though, Doc. And I promise we’ll use the guard next time.”

The hypospray takes care of the discomfort she’s probably feeling. Then he gets Nurse Shetar, the way he always does when it’s just him and a female patient’s crotch. Shaw laughs at that too. 

Shetar looks like six feet of angry cat. “ _Again_?” she yowls, then hisses something filthy under her breath. “If I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a thousand times…”

  


Renar and Chekov are shoveling piles of pamphlets into the garbage chute a little ways from sickbay.

“Not too much,” Scotty says through the communicator, “or you’ll clog the incinerator again.”

Chekov’s doing the bristly cat-eye thing again. “If I find whoewer did this, I will throw _them_ into the incinerator.”

Renar cackles.

  


“And it never occurred to you to use, I dunno, wax? A heat stick? Nefortohine drops?”

Hskak’s ears droop, tail curling under the bed. “I guess not.”

Leonard raises an eyebrow. “You _guess_? Your whiskers are singed and you’ve got serious burns on your _dick_ , and the best you can say is ‘I guess’?” He sighs, trying not to growl. “The burns are mostly healed. It’ll take another week for the tissue to return to normal, so I’m going to give you a cream to put on it. I can give you a supplement to help with your balance while your whiskers heal, but I can’t do anything to speed up the process. Keep ‘em clean and they should heal up fine. Try not to use any harsh chemicals on our face. This,” Leonard holds up a square of plastipaper, “is a coupon for nefortohine , which I expect you to _use_ so that this never happens again. Understand?”

Hskak nods, the picture of dejection. The damage to his fur was fortunately just a cosmetic issue, but it’d be obvious until he shed; if anything, having to slink out of sickbay with uneven fur and a limp would encourage him to do what he’d been told.

This ship needs some sort of safe sex seminar. 

  


There are two species in Leonard’s genetic history good at clinging to things, and he’s thankful to both of them when the bridge starts shaking like a maraca. He clings to the rail and is spared the trial of crashing to the floor. 

“Report,” Jim snaps in his captain voice. 

“Unidentified craft uncloaked underneath us. They’re trying to use a tractor beam.”

“Fire a warning shot and hail them.”

The person who answers has a lot of tentacles coming from their face. It makes along stream of angry clicking noises.

“I am Captain James T Kirk of the –“

The clicking gets angrier. The ship shudders violently. Jim sighs and throws a glance over his shoulder. “Hey Bones, maybe you should head back to sickbay.”

Leonard scowls. “Would you like me to fall now or in the hallway?”

He comes to stand behind Jim’s chair; at least from here he gets a better view.

The angry clicking comes to an abrupt halt. 

“Uhura, please tell me you’ve figured out what they’re saying.”

“I think I –” Nyota lets out a series of high pitched whistles.

Tentacle-face chirps back, and apparently questioning tones are universal.

Nyota blinks rapidly. “It wants to know how many…eggs? We have on the ship.”

Jim frowns. “As in ovulation or literal egg laying?”

“I…” Nyota pauses when the creature chirps again. “Pregnant. How many pregnant people we have on board the ship.”

After a short pause, the entire bridge crew turns to stare at Leonard.

He glares. “Five. Not that it’s any of their business.”

“Six,” Spock corrects. “Ensign Rogath expressed her concerns to me earlier.”

Leonard shrugs, folding his arms awkwardly over his stomach. “Six then. Chanuk and Rogers don’t count.”

“Stasis, huh? I get it.” Jim sighs. “Uhura, tell them…”

“On it.”

“And ask them why they want to know.”

The rest of the conversation proceeds in chirps and whistles. Nyota assumes the professional face she wears when she feels that her real reactions would be inappropriate.

“They’ve decided that we’re not a warship and apologize for trying to attack us. They want to congratulate us on our hatchlings and offer advice for a safe route.”

Jim makes a high choked noise. “I see. I guess people in the family way don’t travel on their warships?”

The rest of the meeting goes agreeably. Tentacle-face welcomes the opportunity to greet “a Federation ambassador and family” and offers to send its own family over in a show of good faith. Nyota manages to talk them out of it.

Jim slouches in his seat when they break contact.

“New plan: keep a pregnant crew member on hand for emergencies. You want a chair, Bones?”

  


His sickbay has been invaded by shamefaced engineering staff. 

“Some pamphlets got too close to the warp core,” Christine says in explanation. “Scotty threw a fit to make you proud.”

“Any serious injuries?”

“Minor cuts and bruises. Watery eyes, minor irritations. Chou inhaled some plastipaper fumes and it aggravated her lungs – Shetar’s taking care of her. I gave Wodlorth a topical steroid to keep him from flaring. It could’ve been worse. I feel sorrier for whoever’s been spreading those xenopedia things around.”

Leonard shakes his head. “Let’s split them down the middle. Cuts or burns?”

  


“Doctor?”

Leonard looks up from his PADD to see Thomas, Craft, and Tbak standing in the door to his office.

“Can we talk to you?”

He waves them in.

“Jack and Nbira are pregnant,” Craft says without preamble. 

“And I assume you-”

“Yes. For both.”

“Half are Jack’s,” Tbak says, “but overall you are correct. We plan to continue both, and we would like to discuss our care options.

Leonard nods. “Let me bring up a few species specifics and we’ll get started. Would you like to be issued larger quarters?”

“Please,” Thomas says, speaking for the first time.

Leonard makes a note to talk to him one on one as soon as possible.

  


Jim comes in with a bad sprain and an even worse bruise. Leonard frowns.

“Don’t start! I already know I pushed it.”

Leonard keeps his voice low. “What’s going on? You haven’t had the time to get into a fight and I know you aren’t into stuff like this.”

“Pushed it too far,” Jim says, pointing at his ankle. “Didn’t fall properly,” he adds, pointing to the bruise.

“Jim,” Leonard says. That’s all he needs to say.

“If this thing with the Agneeran colony doesn’t work out, Ageera and Momsan are going to go to war. They have _got_ to know we’re taking this seriously.”

“Solak is one of our most respected ambassadors.”

“Have you seen the state of this ship?! If the admiralty sees this I’m going to be demoted so fast…”

“It’s not _that_ bad.”

“Pamphlets. In. The. Warp. Core.”

Leonard sighs. “Okay, so it’s bad. Is beating yourself up really going to help? It’s hard to take control when you look like you fell off the back of a truck.”

“I have fallen off the back of a-”

Leonard glares.

“I get it. I just…if the treaty falls apart because of me I’ll-”

“It won’t.” Leonard’s a bit gentler than usual giving Jim the hypo. “It’ll be fine.”

  


“How are you feeling Ensign Thomas?”

“Call me Jack, please.”

Leonard nods. “Jack. Chapel gave you your first scan today. Everything’s progressing normally.”

“That’s…good.”

Leonard puts his elbows on the desk, leaning forward in his chair. “I noticed that you weren’t as enthusiastic as the other members of your triad.”

Jack shifts awkwardly and then he looks over his shoulder. “Um….”

Leonard straightens. “I’d like to remind you that these sessions are confidential. You’re free to tell your partner afterwards of course, but for the next hour everything that happens in this room is between you and me. Anyone who listened in on this conversation – even telepathically – would be committing a crime.”

Jack looks down.

“Let me put it another way. If anyone – be it Spock, your triad, or God himself – spied on us? I’d rip their heads off right before I turned them in.”

Jack blinks, startled. Then, very slowly, he smiles.

  


“T’sana doesn’t have the time.”

“Doesn’t have time for a twenty minute consult? Fuck.” Leonard rubs a hand over his eyes. “Try T’preah or Stulon, or hell, even Telvek will do.”

Christine nods. “I’ll try.” She holds up a cylinder. “Here’s the stasis pod you asked for.”

“Thanks. When I bring this back have Conway add it to the adoption list. Level two, triple cross, clean.”

“Any special concerns?”

“It needs to get done by the time we reach the starbase so it can be traded off.”

Christine barely avoids rolling her eyes. “Yes sir.”

“One more thing?”

Christine raises her eyebrows.

“Try and keep this under wraps. I trust _you_ , but I don’t want other people’s tongues wagging.”

Christine’s expression sharpens. “Anything I can do to help?”

“The consult would be nice.”

“Yes sir.”

  


“And we stand in a hole and the hole asks us questions. Are Earth schools like that?”

“I can’t think of any that are.”

“Vulcans are _weird_ ,” Joanna says with feeling. “Will the baby go to school here?”

“I don’t know. It’s too soon to decide.”

“I guess. T’Niri says Vulcans _hafta_ go to Vulcan school. I don’t think that’s fair.”

Leonard pictures the incredibly earnest conversations Joanna and T’Niri must have and tries not to laugh.

“-she likes my weekend clothes so sometimes we share. Her mommy got mad but Grandpa said it was il-illoth-”

“Illogical?”

“Yeah! To stunt her curiosity. So we play dress up sometimes because imagination leads to in-in-ingenutery?”

“Ingenuity.”

“Yeah that!” Joanna beams. “I was close! T’Niri and I are going to have lots of ingenutity because we like to play dress up and pretend. T’Niri says playing pretend is illogical but I told her that not being able to pretend means you don’t have any imagination, and people without any imagination are damn stupid stiffs. Grandpa says I’m not supposed to say things like ‘damn stupid’ but you do! But he says not many people would appreshate my colorful metaphors.”

“Maybe you should save your colorful metaphors for when you’re grown up. I’m sure they’ll appreciate them then.”

“I guess you’re right.” Joanna sighs. “Grown-ups get to do all the fun stuff. When I’m a grown-up I’m gonna use colorful metaphors all the time, and play as much dress up as I want. Nobody’d say its illogical then.”

Leonard saves a copy of the vidcall so he can watch it again later, talk about a dress-up scholarship and all.

  


Chou is getting a breathing treatment when Leonard walks in.

“The incinerator clogged again,” Christine explains. “It was taken care of before the fumes spread too far, but Chou was the one working it when it happened.”

Leonard sighs and goes into storage. When he comes back, Christine is helping Chou take the mask off. Leonard hands over a small machine.

“You can keep this one on you at all time. Nurse Chapel will provide the medication, and you need to remember to check the water level every day. Until we get this xenopedia plague taken care of, this little box will be your best friend. _Do not lose it. Do not leave it behind. Do not hesitate to use it._ If I find out you have done any of those things you will be confined to quarters for your own wellbeing; this is the third time in less than a week you’ve been in here. Do you understand?”

Chou nods, still a little breathless. Christine is already gone to get the right insert. Leonard takes Chou through its operation twice in the time it takes for her to come back.

“We’re all set.” She says, handing Chou three vials. “Take care of yourself.”

When Chou is gone, Christine groans. “When I find the bastard that started this xenopedia shit, I’m going to skin them.”

  


Crispin is crying in the supply room. Leonard resists the urge to turn around and walk away.

“Is everything alright?”

Crispin looks up at him with wide watery eyes. “Everything’s fine.”

As lies go it’s pretty terrible, especially when Crispin breaks out in fresh sobs.

Crispin, it seems, is coming up on the anniversary of the last time he saw his friends alive; all of them had been killed during the destruction of Vulcan. Crispin had just gotten word that his mother was dying, acidic vomit had brought him down to only one uniform shirt, and

“To top it all off, I found out that Betazidal is breaking up! They didn’t even announce it properly: all their fans found out about it third hand.”

Leonard had heard enough “teenagers listening to Betazidal” jokes at the academy to know exactly what type of music that band put out. He’s in no real position to judge anyone’s musical taste – he listens to too much twenty-first century music himself.

Still, if Crispin is the type who was so heavily invested in Betazidal’s music as to be completely broken down by the band’s dissolution…

Leonard eases himself into a seated position. “Crispin. Joshua. That’s-”

“Stupid,” Crispin wails. “I know. I’m sorry. I just can’t help it.”

“It’s not stupid.” Leonard sighs. “There’s a lot going on for you right now. There’s nothing stupid about crying when you’re stressed.”

This part is going to be awkward, but he’d kick himself if he never brought it up. “Joshua, have you been having any thoughts of-”

Crispin winces and cuts him off. “Do I have to?”

Leonard raises an eyebrow.

Crispin nods, dabbing halfheartedly at his face. “A few. I’ve been dealing with it. I’ve been using nefortohine and ice, but I haven’t really needed to since my last therapist died.”

Also thanks to the Narada. Fuck.

“You haven’t been talking to anyone since then?”

Crispin shrugs. “I haven’t really needed to? I had the music, and I had my mom, and the Enterprise makes it really easy to focus on something else. There’s always something going on.”

Leonard nods. He takes a moment to think about what he’s going to say. “I’m a doctor, not a psychiatrist, but I know a few things. Betazidal was one of your coping methods, correct?”

Crispin nods hesitantly. “I _know_ what everyone says, but it really-”

“Cool it. That’s not my point. What I’m saying is, it’s normal to be upset when you lose one of your coping methods, especially with all the other bad news you’ve had. It’s not stupid, it’s not silly, and it’s nothing to be ashamed of. I’m not going to chew you out for something you can’t help.”

Crispin grins a little, probably thinking of all the other times Leonard’s chewed him out for perfectly normal reactions.

“ _However_ ,” and Leonard puts on the stern voice he uses on Jim, “if I find out you’ve gone any longer without finding a new therapist I might. You might not have turned to substitutions for self harm if you’d kept up with your appointments. I’ve told you time and time again that you’re no good to the people in my sickbay if you refuse to take care of yourself. Nefortohine is working _now_ , but what will you do when it stops being enough?”

Crispin is shamefaced, but not tearful. Leonard is very free with his scoldings, especially when it comes to his staff, and he knows for a fact that Crispin had specifically requested the Enterprise. Crispin would dilly-dally when it came to his own wellbeing, but he was quick to jump when it had anything to do with his job. That was one of the reasons Leonard put up with the kid’s growing pains.

Crispin’s face is still wet, but there are no new tears. The threat to his job performance had galvanized him.

“Now, first you’re going to help me up-”

Leonard sees Crispin suppress a grin.

“-and then we’ll see about getting you another shirt.”

“Yes sir,” Crispin says. He makes quick work of wiping his face.

  


Leonard opens the latest package to appear on his desk. Tiny socks. They can work. So can the tiny orthodontic pacifiers.

He’s not sure about the claw covers, but he appreciates the thought. He’s going to end up re-gifting a lot.

  


The last stack of xenopedia pamphlets goes into the incinerator. There’s a loud cheer.

“We’re going to have a celebration,” Jim shouts over the din. “Let’s go everyone!”

The next day, Leonard and his staff hand out a lot of hangover cures and sobriety meds, but it’s worth it to walk the halls without wading through plastipaper.

Leonard drinks some old fashioned sweet tea to celebrate.

  


“This is T’Niri,” Joanna says, leaning over so a small, solemn-faced Vulcan girl can fit on the screen.

“Hello,” T’Niri says. Her voice is high and clear. “I am a friend of your daughter.”

“He knows that,” Joanna whispers too loudly. T’Niri doesn’t pay her any mind.

She’s wearing some of Joanna’s barrettes and a bright yellow shirt that’s too large for her. 

“Joanna says you are grumpy like a Terran cat,” the girl intones. “I see now that that was a failure of imagination. You are much more like the blug-blatter beasts residing in the southern hills.”

“But T’Niri, those are _ugly_!”

T’Niri purses her lips. “I find them quite aesthetically pleasing.”

Joanna makes a face. “Is this gonna be like Stolek? Daddy, Stolek looks like a pickled fish!”

Leonard doesn’t fight the smile bursting out of him, or the chuckle that follows right on its heels.

T’Niri and Joanna are a perfect pair.

  


“Doctor!”

Leonard sneezes.

“Doctor,” Shetar begins again. “Ensign Tsorkad’s illness has spread to one of the Agneeran underlings. Nurse Chapel is dealing with her now. I took it upon myself to put Tsorkad in isolation, as well as the others who are infected. With your permission, I’d like to sterilize all of our equipment.”

“Go ahead,” Leonard says, pulling himself to his feet. “When you’ve done that, bring me the profile on that bug again. We might be looking at a mutation.”

“Very good sir.”

Shetar hesitates just outside the door, tail swishing furiously. Leonard hurries to see what’s caught her attention.

Just outside the door is a small heart-shaped booklet, with “xenopedia written on it in large letters”. There are two more lying innocently on the nearest biobed.

Leonard and Shetar stare at each other with growing horror.

“Shit.”

**Author's Note:**

> For the longfic bingo prompt “mpreg”.


End file.
